"Life is short
Really short!
So we must gladden the hearts of those who travel with us.
Oh, be swift to love.
Because in both happiness and in sorrow,
life is precious in itself and;
Perhaps, we need to ask nothing more of it than this:
Be what we can be where we are with what we have.
Experience deeply all that we can experience,
And love desperately all that we can love."

-unknown
(thanks J. Hamilton for sending)

onomatopoem


turning my face up to the showerhead
setting the alarm, again, and getting back into bed
turning one last page
no one makes demands,
(except for my mother)
the remote control might never leave my hand
i can eat a shrimp enchilada every day
no one to hear about these dreams
except for sal and gustavo
my private ceremonies
my excellent jokes
the long deep breaths
and the red candle burning on the mantle
and the light of my laptop
i can slip in and out of the world at will
if the phone rings, will i answer?
if you knock at my window,
will i come and let you in?
and if you say
i'll be there
will
i be there?
you sew me up for moments at a time
your face
you fascinate me for a week
for months you think
i am yours
i wish you were right

i don't remember what i was watching, though i feel it must have been a documentary- what is that show on National Geographic with the funny little British fellow who puts himself through all kinds of torments? the hottest, coldest, wettest, driest places in the world... at any rate, i think it was he, who was on some tiny island inhabited almost entirely by tiny birds which flocked all day long in the skies over this little bit of rock off in the grim horse lattitudes of some remote sea. one of the few people who lived there was regarded as something of an eccentric even by his fellow islanders. he would wake up every morning and climb a steep hill holding a long pole with a net at the one end and a sack tied at his waist, and he would spend all day swiping teeny uccellini out of the air. when his sack was full, he'd go home and pour their soft little carcasses out onto his table, each little head rolling on a neck he had snapped between two fingers, and then he would pluck their feathers, bird by bird, and grill the creatures on his fire. this was his only sport, his only work, his only food, other than the plants that grew wild on the island. he didn't know how old he was, nor who his parents had been. the only things he knew were the net and the flocks, the necks, the feathers and the fire. sleeping, waking, the sea, sky, rocks, consumption and elimination. wind. bellwether.
what incredible clarity.

Today's poem II

Ya se ha puesto la noche bastante oscura
Cuando me empiesas a mecer

En las cuevas y bajos las calles
Entre las curvitas dulces y secretas
donde se callen finalmente
las canciones de los pajaritos, y
las alas de mariposas muertas
Allí. donde corren con sangre y jugos electricos
El color del melon maduro,
El color del fondo del mar
Allí se oyen de ahora en cuando
pasos, tronos, y se han sentido a veces
unos tambores discretos
Pero hoy
Se me olvidan todas las casualidades
Que me dejaron aquí
Encima de esta pequeña montaña,
(Bueno, pero no esta tan pequeña, eh?)

Al amanecer
A veces
Se me aparecen
Los colores de esos paises descubiertos
-Como me decia ese amigo mio?
A, sí -
Fenomenales


or, translated to English, -

It’s already very dark
When gently you begin to rock me


In the caves and below the streets
In the sweet hidden curves
Where birds’ songs and the wings of dead butterflies rest

There, where blood and electric juices run
The color of a ripe melon,
The color of the bottom of the ocean

There, where every now and then
the footsteps and thunderbolts have been heard,
I perceive some discreet drumbeat

Today, for a change,
I’ve forgotten the arbitrary circumstances
That left me here atop this little mountain
(not so little)

So then, at dawn
The colors of those countries
I had not seen
Appear to me
-how did my friend use to say it-
ahh,
phenomenal.

These are our histories

in a light sweat
all parts dusted with salt and sugar
certain faces express themselves in the dark
as reliefs of hypnagogic gold
two dissimilar skins pressing together
awakening familiar human geographies
to new configurations
like homonyms
equal tones, disparate in meaning
these are our histories
what skin has learned
skin shares secretly, with rare, precious strangers
between dreams
singing softly
we to us
at midnight and at dawn

enigmiac: Rearing in quaffed monk, you stun me by employing eight windows when the priest is but iodine.
VanessaIAB: the dinosaurs, they leapt and quailed and spat and slept and loved where i bought my mcgriddle.
enigmiac: You turn the atmosphere wild with currents of vitriol when you smile at the passing insects.
VanessaIAB: no one's making bricks of mud anymore and yet up up up up up go the towering structures of brown like poos from a colossal rectangular rectum.
enigmiac: Your eyes flash upon my cathode ray flesh in a manner that propels my viscera into an eternal state of turgid flux.
enigmiac: this would be much easier on you if you had what I have
VanessaIAB: i like the manhattan bridge best because it is blue.
VanessaIAB: last night i danced in the cobbled streets of dumbo while miles away my true love lay and tory played scrabble. the quesadillas were delicious.
enigmiac: the turpid climate of my welcome yesterday evening was warning enough that the summer season shall be sluggish, and devoid of any true combustion.
enigmiac: *torpid
VanessaIAB: turpid is better, love
enigmiac: your supercallowfragilekissessexmeoutthedoorstop
VanessaIAB: yoursouporsaladisdelicousnmyappetite'sferocious
enigmiac: haha
enigmiac: but I stole mine from a song
VanessaIAB: not me i'm an original baby
enigmiac: that's so AWESOME, and you don't even know why
VanessaIAB: ?
enigmiac: the song is called "free los angeles" by my new favorite band, "baby"
VanessaIAB: GOOD NAME!
enigmiac: yeah
enigmiac: you'll love them
enigmiac: I'll drag you out to see them one of these days
VanessaIAB: mmm
VanessaIAB: baby
enigmiac: it's such a great word
VanessaIAB: baby just rolllls offa da tongue
enigmiac: aww baby
VanessaIAB: *gasped at the precipice of ecstasy* baby
enigmiac: *laying in post coitial bliss* thank you baby
VanessaIAB: mmm
VanessaIAB: love that so much
VanessaIAB: the thank yous
enigmiac: of course
enigmiac: and I'll play you free los angeles later
VanessaIAB: weeoooh!
enigmiac: I wish I had a little guitar I could fold up and take with me everywhere
enigmiac: oh, here's something you'll surely enjoy
VanessaIAB: whatta concept
enigmiac: http://www.madsci.org/cgi-bin/cgiwrap/~lynn/jardin/SCG/
VanessaIAB: all the bonus but none of the looking like a pretentious jerk
enigmiac: exactly
enigmiac: I want something pocket sized
enigmiac: I wish I had an invisibility cloak too
VanessaIAB: Most certainly, your fingernails stimulate magnetism in the most organic of solvents!
VanessaIAB: ohniiiiice
VanessaIAB: ohgodohgod
VanessaIAB: Cry for the stiffness of the earlobe. The turtles are fallen and the rain stands still. How long must I suffer with your undergarments?
enigmiac: Your moist towelette speaks to me as the disgruntled post man listens attentively while pumping the iron pumpkin.
VanessaIAB: coffee was in nose, now on laptop
enigmiac: mwahahaha
enigmiac: I hope it wasn't hot
VanessaIAB: tepid
VanessaIAB: numm
VanessaIAB: evens smells restorative
VanessaIAB: wish it tasted as good
enigmiac: the tepid coffee from your nose glistens like brown diamonds on the glossy surface of your laptop
VanessaIAB: twin fingers of coffee paused in spacetime
extruded from my nostrils, grappling, glistening pseudopods
peering into the cold, outer light.
later, in a frozen snapshot of eternity they lay shattered across the letters T, G, H, N, Y and W like cabochons of glimmering smog.
VanessaIAB: too many likes in that sentence
enigmiac: full of similies
VanessaIAB: like life
enigmiac: no, life is full of smiles, if you look in the right places
VanessaIAB: from my nostrils
enigmiac: No, not there.
VanessaIAB: Haaaa!
VanessaIAB: from my nostrils, extrusions of coffee paused in spacetime, like grappling, glistening pseudopods, peering into the cold, outer light.
in another frozen snapshot of eternity they lay shattered far below
across the letters T, G, H, N, Y and W -
cabochons of glimmering smog.
enigmiac: better, I like it
VanessaIAB: right on
VanessaIAB: clive barker's The Great And Secret Show, some of the bad guys were a race of monolithic lovecraftian freakazoids called the Iad Ourobouros.
enigmiac: I'm agreeing with you
enigmiac: backing you up
enigmiac: I got your back baby, from here to eternity
VanessaIAB: monolithic lovecraftian freakazoids pretty much sums that shit up
enigmiac: wordy mcword
enigmiac: vowels mcconsonants
VanessaIAB: i got your back too - till atoms lose the will to keep it together
enigmiac: haha
enigmiac: playing scrabble last night
enigmiac: I got to use my favorite word
enigmiac: ion
enigmiac: and then, later, scions
VanessaIAB: niiiice
VanessaIAB: powermove
enigmiac: I love those words
enigmiac: because of you, many many years ago
VanessaIAB: moi?
enigmiac: si, toi
enigmiac: we were sitting in the library at dwight
enigmiac: and you handed me "the sword of shannara" by terry brooks
enigmiac: and said here, read this
VanessaIAB: ohhhh yesss
VanessaIAB: actually maybe Elfstones of Shannara
enigmiac: maybe
VanessaIAB: that was the best one
VanessaIAB: loved Allanon
enigmiac: but one of the later books is called the scions of shannara
enigmiac: there are like 9 or 10 books in that set now
VanessaIAB: yup
VanessaIAB: Demonize your sofa. It will lend forth more peanuts between the cushions.
enigmiac: my login message this morning was "today is a good day to disappoint a good friend in need"
enigmiac: it actually made me mad
VanessaIAB: login message?
VanessaIAB: buh?
enigmiac: when I log into my computer, it prints a funny message to the screen
VanessaIAB: how you get it to do that???
enigmiac: for example:
enigmiac: With a rubber duck, one's never alone.
enigmiac: you have to use linux :-(
VanessaIAB: too true, she said, nodding sagely
enigmiac: or
enigmiac: He hadn't a single redeeming vice. -- Oscar Wilde
enigmiac: It wasn't that she had a rose in her teeth, exactly. It was more like the rose and the teeth were in the same glass.
enigmiac: some are funnier than others
VanessaIAB: niiice
VanessaIAB: classay!
VanessaIAB: can i just say
VanessaIAB: Cry for the stiffness of the earlobe. The turtles are fallen and the rain stands still. How long must I suffer with your undergarments?
enigmiac: forever, said the duck
VanessaIAB: so perfection that it hurts me unduly

Sometimes sitting at home, sweating, hollering 'ASSHOLE' at the top of your lungs is actually the only thing you can do.

Who knew?

time is a circle
circles to be traced
take my fingers back ten, fifteen years
i am shrinking back to when i was growing up
these are the physical sensations:
the musics and the people and their faces
the middle of the night
the roof, the sounds of the crickets and
the train rattling in the meadowlands

the whispering of my cigarette against terra cotta painted green

the smell of the ashes from my drawer

the appaling reality of seven a.m.,

which i have never outgrown,
the truth of darkness, punctuated by infrequent lights
the same fears
going back these ten or fifteen years
can i put my head down on the ground?
can i cry out?
some days i am running through the lightest air
the water receives me
there is peace in footsteps and phone calls
some days i really wonder about you people,
i wonder what i am really doing here
at all

 
last week's triumphs turn
to this week's regrets, I've learned
seamlessly, in dreams

 

my poem today,

cantando constantemente
como las velas
de las abuelas
sin consuelo
me aparecen luces en el silencio
en la noche, solita en la cama
quemada por las llamas, las llamadas
volando y separando

callan las aguas del cielo
pero sigo muriéndome de sed
coño, ¿y cómo me metí yo en ésto?

roughly translated:

i sing constantly,
as my grandmothers' candles burn,
inconsolably.
lights appear in the silence
at night, alone in my bed
i'm burned by my flames, by telephone calls
which float, and diverge.
water falls from the sky,
yet i am always dying of some thirst.
shit. how did i get myself into this mess?

 
 
VanessaIAB (11:41:28 AM): my friend Doron is singing a little song
VanessaIAB (11:41:32 AM): he made up
VanessaIAB (11:41:41 AM): called "Fuck the World"
enigmiac (11:41:47 AM): I need to hear it
VanessaIAB (11:42:21 AM): fuck the world/make it a better place/for you me and everybody else/there are birds dying/and we don't really care
enigmiac (11:42:30 AM): haha
VanessaIAB (11:42:54 AM): fuck the world/make it a better place/we hate boys/and we hate girls who don't know what they're doing
enigmiac (11:43:00 AM): lol
VanessaIAB (11:43:01 AM): tralalallaaaalaa
VanessaIAB (11:43:28 AM): kill the birds/yesyesyesyeeeeessss/kill it kill it KILL IT, BABY!
VanessaIAB (11:45:17 AM): make it a better place for you and me and everyone who would like to die today 
VanessaIAB (11:47:47 AM): i changed my sexiest on-screen love scene in salon personals to "The diner scene in Howard the Duck"
enigmiac (11:48:14 AM): LOL
enigmiac (11:48:24 AM): that, my dear, is why you are the perfect woman
VanessaIAB (11:49:08 AM): haaaaaaaaaa
enigmiac (11:49:32 AM): for me, anyway
VanessaIAB (11:49:41 AM): when that guys turns into an evil alien and the world is about to end, only it doesent, because it gets saved by a GIANT TALKING DUCK
VanessaIAB (11:49:44 AM): WITH ARMS
enigmiac (11:49:51 AM): and fingers
enigmiac (11:49:54 AM): don't forget the fingers

 

 

Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all convictions, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity. Surely some revelation is at hand; Surely the Second Coming is at hand. The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert A shape with lion body and the head of a man, A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds. The darkness drops again; but now I know That twenty centuries of stony sleep Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle, And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

 
there are two voices on the other end of the line 
this time last week, one of them was mine -
keeping up the necessary empathy,
or maybe the appearance thereof,
was much, much easier
on the other end of two thousand miles.
i do know that trying to be good is really not the same as the real thing at all.
he always took the phone to the bedroom, though, 
and i was reverent, patient, and silent
each time you called.
i guess that would explain 
why your beautiful voices
and the disconnected distances that spring up overnight 
electrified fences, frayed selvedges, stark palisades and hedges 
have left nothing connecting us
except three voices in thin air, pitched too high. 
i felt my stomach rumble down deep
and my lungs fill to push against my heart
i'm so sorry to be small, but i don't think i promised -
what did i know -
that i would never let these things happen

gpesoa says:
aviravirmayeddhidharmasivayanassanimamundi!
 
I'm not not licking toads... says:
osolemiosolemnissimoarrividerlaaldilaicinominepatriisefilliisespiritosantisenmundoseculumsecularumamen
gpesoa says:
ostabatmaterdolorosaymelosachocolatosaperadonaisabaothmetrathononaglajesuchristiredemptorhominietricottaconnuecesamén!
I'm not not licking toads... says:
achtungmonsoontyphoonbassoonsturmunddranggrandreinedrag
 
gpesoa says:
einekleinenachtvanessaplusapplestrudelversussadnessworeinmalvonquestognocchiwogeborenichunddu
I'm not not licking toads... says:
fragglejabbabaccawookieETkookyskookchinookwendigoetorc

gpesoa says:
flotsamjetsamalakazamkhakikiroakahasiaguadebebertweedlededeedidomdarú

I'm not not licking toads... says:
shintooboebashokobehomomomomuumuututubooboocoocookachooperiodebleupetitechouchoumojodojorobomototelefoto

You're not friends. You'll never be friends. You'll be in love till it kills you both. You'll fight, and you'll shag, and you'll hate each other till it makes you quiver, but you'll never be friends. Love isn't brains, children, it's blood...blood screaming inside you to work its will. I may be love's bitch, but at least I'm man enough to admit it.
-Spike

We might kiss when we are alone
When nobody's watching
We might take it home
We might make out when nobody's there
It's not that we're scared
It's just that it's delicate

So why do you fill my sorrow
With the words you've borrowed
From the only place you've know
And why do you sing Hallelujah
If it means nothing to you
Why do you sing with me at all?

We might live like never before
When there's nothing to give
Well how can we ask for more
We might make love in some sacred place
The look on your face is delicate

So why do you fill my sorrow
With the words you've borrowed
From the only place you've know
And why do you sing Hallelujah
If it means nothing to you
Why do you sing with me at all?


-Damien Rice, 'Delicate'

Yaki Torysan: hello
VanessaIAB: baby
Yaki Torysan: you busy?
VanessaIAB: always but never
VanessaIAB: when it comes to the chosen few
Yaki Torysan: what I mean is, can you/do you want to talk
VanessaIAB: unless i'm getting
VanessaIAB: yelled at
VanessaIAB: sure call me
VanessaIAB: 212
Yaki Torysan: and... and... and... am I one of the few?
VanessaIAB: 609
Yaki Torysan: I can't phone right now
VanessaIAB: 3729
Yaki Torysan: but I'll write it down
VanessaIAB: ok
VanessaIAB: my feet are smelly today
VanessaIAB: hmm
VanessaIAB: they're not usually smelly feet
Yaki Torysan: nice
Yaki Torysan: is that your cell #?
VanessaIAB: they smell like guacamole
VanessaIAB: no
VanessaIAB: office
VanessaIAB: here till six
VanessaIAB: i hope
Yaki Torysan: you hope?
VanessaIAB: unless i go real slow
VanessaIAB: :-(
Yaki Torysan: ahh
Yaki Torysan: I'm going really fast today
Yaki Torysan: I don't know why
VanessaIAB: where r u anyhow
Yaki Torysan: suffern
VanessaIAB: i'm sorry to hear that
VanessaIAB: but where are u?
VanessaIAB: hahahaha
Yaki Torysan: hahah

I miss you, lovers
Come back, all of you
And let me take my pleasures like I used to do
Forget the end and spiral back to the beginning
Where memories waited fresh like flowers in plastic at the grocery store
All spangled with cold water and neon light
Come back, my lovers and tell me again for the first time
I miss your finer moments-
I miss mine
It was a long while ago
And like a novel,
I will re-read you, and if it's been long enough,
Perhaps we can forget the ending?
Please, come back lovers
Let's tell stories
Let's surprise each other
I remember your black eyelashes and green eyes
And your freckled shoulders
And your laugh
I remember
Before you belonged to someone else
Before, I was someone else
Roll back the river
Erase my lies,
these lines beneath my eyes
Oh my lovely loves
We should have done better the first time
We should have done it all better the first time

My best emails:

On 10/29/03 4:09 PM, "Soto, Vanessa B" wrote:

hello
my headache is a mile-high storm cloud of shrimpy pink and mango orange sprouting sizzling lime lightning and looming over a landscape of sad, bilious greenish-gray avocado. in fifty-eight minutes I can go home, and I'll call you so we can chat for a while, if you like. meantime, edit credit memo written by venezuelan Tanya. intense.
i'll go talk to the moaners, who have been creating an eBay ad for me. they tell me i'm going to make them rich. they also say 'snake!'
NWOT and available at a superlow reserve,
Vanessa

On 10/30/03 3:08 PM, "Soto, Vanessa B" wrote:


i try to get the self-loathing out of the way while i am awake. spreading the lord's word? well, i'm smiling. what would a good Lord's word be?
they won't let me take Monday afternoon off. in fact, someone asked me this morning whether there are conference rooms on the 15th floor, and i said " How would I know? I have to tell someone when I'm going to the ladies' room." that might've been a bit gruff.
but the assistants, the analysts, the admins, the lowly ones who rise at dawn to change the copy paper and refill the toner cartridges!
when will my people be free?

-----Original Message-----
From: Vanessa
Sent: Wednesday, June 02, 2004 9:52 AM
To: Dean; Rick
Subject: RE: fyi


not even punctuation could save that one-


-----Original Message-----
From: Dean
Sent: Wednesday, June 02, 2004 9:46 AM
To: Vanessa; Rick
Subject: RE: fyi


is the fish speak

-----Original Message-----
From: Vanessa
Sent: Wednesday, June 02, 2004 9:45 AM
To: Rick; Dean
Subject: RE: fyi


Excellent. Perhaps then you will be able to keep Mandelbrot and Reimann straight.
Blub, blub, blub,
v

-----Original Message-----
From: Rick
Sent: Wednesday, June 02, 2004 9:38 AM
To: Vanessa; Dean
Subject: RE: fyi


So far I only have 37 megaGf of piscomputing power - I'm hoping I'll get that promotion so that I can move up to the 50 MGf class of parallel goldfish processing power...

-----Original Message-----
From: Vanessa
Sent: Wednesday, June 02, 2004 9:34 AM
To: Rick; Dean
Subject: RE: fyi


Why 21 and not 20? Are your goldfish so poor they need an extra round, Evans?

-----Original Message-----
From: Rick
Sent: Wednesday, June 02, 2004 9:32 AM
To: Dean; Vanessa
Subject: RE: fyi


Can we at least play 21 questions? That would give the goldfish a chance to kick in...

-----Original Message-----
From: Dean
Sent: Wednesday, June 02, 2004 9:31 AM
To: Rick; Vanessa
Subject: RE: fyi


3rd

-----Original Message-----
From: Rick
Sent: Wednesday, June 02, 2004 9:30 AM
To: Dean; Vanessa

Subject: RE: fyi


[deafening silence]

Point of information - which of the following is an accurate interpretation your punctuationless phrase below:

What? Do you think I am stupid?
What do you think? I am stupid.
What do you think I am, Stupid!

Fractal grammar.

-----Original Message-----
From: Dean
Sent: Wednesday, June 02, 2004 9:25 AM
To: Rick; Vanessa
Subject: RE: fyi


what do you think i am stupid

-----Original Message-----
From: Rick
Sent: Wednesday, June 02, 2004 9:24 AM
To: Dean; Vanessa
Subject: RE: fyi


yes - but the boundary of the Mandelbrot set has complexity of infinite resolution - fractal...

-----Original Message-----
From: Dean
Sent: Wednesday, June 02, 2004 9:22 AM
To: Rick; Vanessa
Subject: RE: fyi


thx...but i have already determined that it does not go to infinity but stops where the modulus of Z is greater than 2?

-----Original Message-----
From: Rick
Sent: Wednesday, June 02, 2004 9:21 AM
To: Dean; Vanessa
Subject: RE: fyi


courtesy of the university of Utah...

http://www.math.utah.edu/~alfeld/math/mandelbrot/mandelbrot.html#applet

-----Original Message-----
From: Dean
Sent: Wednesday, June 02, 2004 8:11 AM
To: Rick; Vanessa
Subject: RE: fyi


Does one of the sequences in mandlebrot set go to infinity...and if not, how far does it go?